THE MAGDALENE SISTERS

UK, 2002, 119 minutes, Colour.
Geraldine McEwan?, Anne-Marie? Duff, Nora Jane Noone, Dorothy Duffy, Eileen Walsh.
Directed by Peter Mullan.

Scots actor director, Peter Mullan, has made an expertly-crafted but grim film about the Catholic Church in Ireland in the mid-60s. He has researched the laundries which were run by sisters who took in young women who had had children out of wedlock or who were considered wayward in sexual behaviour. Often they were called Magdalenes.

In recent years, in the English-speaking world especially, stories of physical and sexual abuse in Church parishes and institutions have surfaced with many priests and brothers facing civil courts and imprisonment. The Magdalene Sisters includes a priest character, the chaplain, whose behaviour reflects this kind of sexual abuse. Fewer sisters have been in court although many stories have been reported of physical cruelty rather than sexual abuse. Much of this cruelty took place during the 1950s and 1960s. The nun characters in this film were trained in the 1950s or earlier. The action takes place during the 1960s.

The film will certainly cause sadness in audiences who have been disturbed by the experiences of the 1990s, the
revelations, the court cases and sentences. It will cause sadness for those who have positive memories of education by sisters and for those who want to see pleasant images of the Church and Church personnel. However, this story, which makes more impact perhaps because it is being seen rather than merely being read, is no less true than many of the recent stories that have been reported even in the Catholic press.

Is the film an attack on the Catholic Church? Peter Mullan says no. That was not his intention. It is a critique of a
religious culture. Obviously it is an attack on and a critique of much of the harshness of the Church which has often been seen as characteristic of a stern Irish Catholicism. It is a critique of the abuse of power and authority in the name of the Church. (An apposite Gospel reference would be Matthew 20:24-28 with Jesus words on power,
authority and service.) Mullan's comment is that Ireland was a theocracy. He has pointed out that in a theocracy, those who accepted this situation were prone to dominating behaviour in God's name. This means that the sisters themselves were victims of this religious-civil collaboration. While priests (as in the film) would make judgments about the young women who were to be sent to the laundries to keep them disciplined and under control, it was also the families who sent their daughters. The latter situation is seen in the film with the young woman who is raped by a cousin. She is either not believed or is blamed and is the innocent scapegoat for the wrong done by the man. At his Venice Festival press conference, Peter Mullan discussed other theocracies and the example was given of the Taliban - which led to some absurdly exaggerated press reports that he had likened the nuns in the film to Taliban leaders.

Although the film does not touch on it - except perhaps in the scene where a benefactor brings the first film to the convent (The Bells of St Mary's) and in the blessing of the new washing machines - this was the period of the Second Vatican Council and the call to rethink religious life and ministry. At what stage this reform was introduced in Ireland, those who remember can tell us, but it might have given some greater nuances to the characters and the behaviour in the film to make it even more compelling drama. One British press reviewer remarked that the film was a 'one-note' film with no variation on its grim storytelling.

However, this is the film that Mullan has made. The performances of the girls are first-rate. The nuns are less clearly drawn, mainly being seen in supervision sequences or in the refectory where their meal was more lavish than that of in the refectory where their meal was more lavish than that of the girls. It is Geraldine McEwan's performance as the superior that demands attention. She has inherited a tradition of the Superior being strong, that her word is final and that she expresses God's will. She is shown to be cruel at times. Much as we might regret it, we can all probably remember religious who acted in this way. We might want to hurry to add that not all religious were like this. That is right. But, this film is a drama rather than a documentary. Most audiences will appreciate, as they would with a film criticising the police or politicians, that the majority of members of the profession did not act in this way.

The Magdalene Sisters can be seen as part of an honest examination of conscience by the Church and a request for
repentance, an expression of sorrow and an apology, something which Pope John Paul II has exemplified and encouraged in recent years.

1. The impact of the film for an Irish audience, non-Irish? The comprehension of the situation, the nuns and their behaviour, the girls? Universal themes of shame, imprisonment, freedom?

2. The use of Scotland for Irish settings? The Celtic air? The institution and its rooms, dormitories, the open fields, the enclosed atmosphere?

3. The opening, the drum, the priest and the song, the tone of the music throughout the film? Celtic?

4. Margaret's story: the celebration, listening to the song, Kevin and his attack on his cousin, the rape and Margaret's resistance, Kevin going out, surly, Margaret telling a relation, her telling the others, the men and their looks and their whispering, Margaret at home, in bed with all the children, got out, put in the car, taken away, her mother weeping? No contact with the family? Her brother coming four years later to take her away? The postscript about her life, in school, never marrying?

5. Bernadette's story, at the orphanage, with the young twins, brushing their hair, the boys and their taunts, staying around, flirting, the principal watching, the priest, her suddenly being taken away, the girls taking her possessions? Her escape with Margaret, the postscript about her marriages and divorce?

6. Rose's story, the love of the baby, holding the baby? Rose's plea, the priest taking her out, the adoption papers, signing the release form? wanting to change her mind, the authorities taking the baby? The postscript after her escape with Bernadette, going to the hairdressers, on the bus to Liverpool, the marriage, her being a faithful Catholic?

7. The portrait of the convent and nuns, audience presuppositions from other films about nuns? Ireland, 1964, sternness, severe habits, the sisters having better meals than the girls, supervising the dormitory, the laundry? The lack of humanity? The Superior not allowing insolence The young sister and her supervision, the old sister in the laundry? The scene in the shower room and the humiliating, teasing sexual game? The processions to the refectory, the work in the garden? Watching the film, the sports afternoon? Vocation language but less of the reality of the commitment to God and the joy of the Gospel?

8. Crispina, mentally impaired, her pregnancy, taking her child away, her sister and the little boy coming to the gate, wave, her communicating by way of the St Christopher medal? Her friendship with Margaret, her despair, her going to bed with the wet clothes, wanting to die from influenza, losing her medal, asking Margaret to find it and her joy? Not blaming Bernadette? The attempt to hang herself and the girls all rallying?

Her relationship with the priest, the sex? The prickles and the rash, at the Eucharistic procession, the humiliation of the priest, her calling out, her being taken away to the mental asylum? The postscript and her dying of anorexia at the age of 24 in the asylum?

9. Una, running away, her cruel father bringing her back and whipping her, Sister Bridget looking, trying to calm him, deciding to become a nun and stay?

10. Katie, her age, mentally impaired, her mother's warning against the soldiers, giving birth? Being in the Magdalenes for forty years? Supervising, harshness, telling the girls off, reporting to the nun? Her illness, her being bedridden, Bernadette and her cruelty, wanting her dead? Seeing an image of herself in forty years? Kissing her brow?

11. Margaret and the possibility of escaping, going outside the gate, not accepting the ride? Going back inside? Her seeing Crispina with the priest, putting the prickles in the laundry, her satisfaction at his pain? Bernadette and her stealing the medal, her cruelty to Katie? Rose and her desperation, going to Sister Bridget, having to search for the key, asking to send a birthday card to her child?

12. The daily routine of the Magdalenes, getting up early, the drill, going to breakfast, the meagre breakfast, the spiritual reading, in the refectory, going to the laundry, the harshness of the washing and scrubbing, the change to the washing machines and the priest blessing them? Hanging the clothes on the line? The drudgery, the holiday - and the orange for Christmas? The sack races and the competitions?

13. The harshness of Irish parents and society, suspicion of waywardness, sending the girls to the Magdalenes, getting them out of the way, loss of contact?

14. The clergy, the harshness of their domination of the laity, decisions about the girls? Father Fitzroy and the convent chaplaincy? His sexual encounters with Crispina? Margaret and the rash? That he was not a good priest?

15. The young man, his sexual advances to Bernadette, curiosity, the deliveries? Bernadette asking him to get the key, his coming in the night, unlocking the door, her hurrying to the door, his locking it again and going away?

16. Ireland as a theocracy, God ruling, the church as the mediator, the role of the celibate clergy, supporting the families, the celibate nuns, running teenage girls' lives? The assumption that teenage girls were temptations to men and therefore should be removed? A harsh theocracy making people bad? The nuns as much victims of the system as the girls? Engendering hate and the victims wanting others to suffer as much as they did?

17. The director declaring that he did not want to attack the Catholic church, but rather ask the church to examine its conscience, see the role of a theocracy, see the cruelty, issues of sexuality and power?